Elizabeth Anscombe was one of the greatest twentieth century philosophers and, in this week’s column, I’d like to consider her argument in her dense and difficult article “On the Source of the Authority of the State.” Anscombe is not hard to understand in the sense that she uses many technical terms that non-philosophers are unlikely to know. She writes in ordinary English.

Why do independent central banks exist in the modern economy? According to J. Keith Horsefield, it was originally thought independent central banks would “prevent [governments’] extravagance from creating inflation and thus leading to financial crashes.” It is almost like the state itself was confessing its ineptitude to intervene in the economy.

The infamous 9/11 attacks took many Americans completely by surprise and seemed to come out of the “clear blue sky.” These attacks appeared random, senseless, and incongruous with the “peaceful” 1990s. However, on September 12, 2001, libertarian activist and former presidential candidate, Harry Browne, was not surprised. He knew what many Americans either didn’t know or had ignored to their detriment—the foreign policy history of the previous decade, the 1990s, and beyond. In an essay entitled “When will we learn?

Modern America has been one of constant shock: decades of war, economic turmoil, covid lockdowns, contested elections, rising political escalation, and resulting political violence. Despite this contemporary backdrop, the assassination of Charlie Kirk is a moment that stands apart in the way that singular death—with a face, a family, a story, a particular context—is always easier to process than a broader event, no matter how horrible.

During the 2024 Presidential campaign, Republican nominee Donald Trump courted libertarians and the crypto community in his successful bid for his second US presidency. In a famous speech at the Bitcoin Conference in Nashville, he promised that, “America will once again be a nation that protects property rights, privacy, freedom of transaction, freedom of association, and freedom of speech.”